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OTTAWA — The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's annual funding from the federal government will be cut by $115 million over the next three years, a blow that could lead to job losses or programming cuts at Canada's public broadcaster.

The number represents about 10 per cent of the annual $1.1-billion injection the corporation receives from the federal government.

The cuts will start this year, with a $27.8-million reduction in government spending on the CBC's operations, and increase to $69.6 million in 2013-14, and finally reach the $115-million savings mark by 2014-15.

The reductions to the public broadcaster, rumoured for months, also could amount to job losses at the CBC at a time the broadcaster already has been paring down and changing its operations to focus on more digital and diverse content.

"These cuts pale in comparison to the Chretien-Martin cuts," said Gregory Thomas from the Canadian Taxpayers Federation. Those cuts, he said, ended with 2,400 layoffs at the public broadcaster. "This isn't going to come close to that."

The Canadian Media Guild, which represents workers at the CBC, said it will be meeting with corporation executives in the coming days to determine who will lose their jobs.

"This is a sad day. We don't yet know exactly what these cuts will mean for CBC/Radio-Canada services and employees," said Marc-Philippe Laurin, president of the Guild's CBC branch. "However, this is a major cut that will surely have a devastating impact on CBC services by 2015."

The curtailment to the CBC is the largest portion of $191.1 million in heritage program cuts over the next three years. Aside from the CBC, the National Film Board will see its budget reduced by $6.7 million over the next three years, while Telefilm Canada will see a $10.6-million budgetary reduction.

The Canada Council for the Arts, the National Gallery of Canada and national museums will not see any budgetary reductions.

"It's a constructive step the government's taking," Thomas said. "We would have preferred to see deeper cuts to all of the cultural welfare programs."

Since the Conservatives won their majority government last May, CBC supporters have voiced concerns that it could disappear. Their concerns were exacerbated when one of CBC's competitors, Quebecor, launched attacks on the public broadcaster.

"We believe in the national public broadcaster," Heritage Minister James Moore said in a postelection victory interview with the CBC last May.

"We have said that we will maintain or increase support for the CBC. That is our platform and we have said that before and we will commit to that."

Until now, the Tories have been consistent with the federal funding flowing to the CBC. Public account documents for 2007 through to last year show that the federal allotment to the CBC has ranged from a low of $1.1 billion in 2006 to a high of $1.14 billion in 2010 and 2011.

"Rural and remote regions will feel the heaviest blows because they often rely on the CBC as their primary media presence," said Tyler Morgenstern of Reimagine CBC, a citizens group associated with the organization OpenMedia.ca.

CBC executives have expressed concern publicly about the future viability of the broadcaster should the cuts to its budget run deep.

"The Corporation's strategic plan . . . was developed on the assumption that CBC/Radio-Canada will have stable funding within the five-year planning period," the CBC wrote in its annual report last year. "While a government funding reduction would not change the path of the new strategy, it could force the corporation to make adjustments."

The watchdog group Friends of Canadian Broadcasting argued that the cuts will lead the CBC to close foreign news bureaus and possibly lead to the death of CBC Radio Two as well as other Canadian programming.

"The Harper government has singled out the CBC for punitive cuts and has broken its election pledge to maintain or increase CBC funding in the process," said group spokesman Ian Morrison.

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